Luke (Bear Shifter) (New World Shifters) Read Free

his finger in every pie. The little shit motel I stayed in, the one that always claimed to have ‘no vacancy’ even though half of the rooms were perennially empty. The outfitter, run by Old Man Cole. The diner, and the pawnshop beside it. Everybody paid Bruno a slice of what they got, or they found the power cut on the colder days or a fire mysteriously start on their property overnight.
    None of that had happened for a while, though. The score had been settled long ago, and Bruno was the undisputed authority. I hadn't seen a cop in town for almost six months, and even when I had him he'd walked straight up to Bruno, shook his hand, clapped him on the back like an old friend and then come to me for a free beer.
    It looked like it was going to be a long night. The Wolf pack always had a few women that hung around them, and occasionally one of the guys would leave with one of the ladies in tow as they headed off to find a spot that was slightly warmer and fractionally more private in order to do their business.
    Cold as it may be outside, Carla and I were working up a sweat in here. The music, some old twangy country thing, poured out of the speakers and made a loud, steel guitar laden backdrop to the tasks that we had to complete.
    There was just the two of us, and we had our hands full. As usual, we were short staffed. Bridget was supposed to be here, but she hadn't bothered to show up. This was the third shift that we had to cover for her, and there wasn't anyone else in town interested in pouring drinks for this lot, especially not at our salary.
    I didn't blame them. After all, free drinks meant no tips, not that the Wolf pack was known for their generosity in the first place. They’d rather just as soon grab your ass and yank you onto their lap as you tried to squeeze by them, and if they did tip you it was only so that they could worm their fingers down the waistband of your jeans when they gave it over to you.
    “Almost there,” Carla panted at me, as we passed each other behind the bar in a hurry to fill the orders.
    “Can't come soon enough,” I responded. It was almost one in the morning, and there were only three members of the Wolf pack left. Other than them, and the cute guy in the corner, we were done for the night.
    By rights we should have been closed at least an hour ago, but one of Bruno's many long-standing rules was that as long as the Wolf pack wanted to drink, they drank. Carla and I were both mentally crossing our fingers, I'm sure, that none of the other members decided to roll in now. A late comer would mean that we would be here forever, though it wasn't uncommon for the sun to rise before we were able to shut up shop, barely able to get the place clean before we had to open it up again.
    If there were other jobs to be had, I'd have quit long ago. But there weren’t. No, I was stuck. And so was Carla. So was Bridget, come to think of it, and if she ever showed back up to work I’d get a chance to tell her that. We’d each fled here for our own reasons, and now that we were here it was harder and harder to earn enough money to get anywhere else.
    It didn't matter. There were worse places we could be. The things we were running from couldn't chase us to Barrow, and sometimes that had to be enough.
    At least that's what I told myself…
    Over the din of the music I heard the scrape of a chair, and two of the three remaining Wolf pack members got drunkenly to their feet and lurched toward the door, arm in arm. They didn't say anything on their way out, thankfully. The less I had to do with them the better, and if they were calling out comments or shouting demands, it would be disrespectful not to respond.
    And nobody, and I mean nobody, disrespected the Wolf pack. At least if they wanted to live.
    There were just the four of us in the bar now, Carla and I getting ready to shut up shop, the handsome loner in the corner with at least eight empty bottles of beer in front of him and a half-full one